White Hats Take to the Web to Dispel Anti-Tax Schemes

By DAVID CAY JOHNSTON

Published: March 25, 2004

IF your boss suggests but does not require that you buy a computer to use at home, can you deduct the cost on your federal tax return? Will taking the home-office deduction make you more likely to be audited?

Questions like these abound at tax time, and many people, eager for a quick answer without having to plow through lengthy Internal Revenue Service publications or pay for expert advice, turn to newsgroups for answers.

But if you ask these kinds of questions in the news groups misc.taxes, us.taxes or Yahoo's legality-of-income-tax group, the answer is likely to be that the tax laws are invalid or that paying taxes is optional. Some of the people providing these blanket responses also recommend where to buy advice on how to avoid paying taxes -- advice that, if followed, is likely to lead to trouble with the I.R.S.

But some tax lawyers and accountants have also taken to the Internet to counter such bad advice.

Quatloos.com, for example, which is run by Jay Adkisson, a lawyer in Laguna Nigel, Calif., includes a forum where people can debate the theories of so-called tax deniers. Taxprophet.com, owned by Robert L. Sommers of San Francisco, includes his essays on tax cons. Daniel B. Evans, a lawyer in Philadelphia, maintains a Web site (evans-legal.com/dan/tpfaq.html) where he debunks tax-denier theories, citing court decisions.

Two accounting experts decided to fight the news groups with one of their own. They started a moderated misc.taxes group in 1995 because tax deniers had overwhelmed the misc.taxes news group and some people posting to the group had even urged violence, a theme that persists in that group and in us.taxes.

Dick Adams, a retired University of Baltimore accounting professor, said he and a friend started the moderated group because the tax-denier arguments were ''clearly drowning out serious discourse.''

''Some of the people who came along were frightening -- one advocated killing police officers -- and you had people who just kept repeating the same nonsense,'' Professor Adams said. ''And one lie compounded on another. There was even an attorney who said he had gotten away without paying taxes, and I went and found a federal tax lien against him, and he would just deny it in the news group.''

Occasionally Professor Adams posts a notice in the misc.taxes and us.taxes groups, sometimes joining Mr. Evans, in pointing out fallacies in tax denier arguments. Others who joust with the tax deniers often post references to the Quatloos, Tax Prophet and Evans Faq Web sites, which explain what the law actually says or how judges have ruled against tax deniers.

In the moderated news group, Professor Adams usually rejects proposed postings spouting tax-denier theories. But advice given by lawyers, accountants and other experts sometimes sparks vigorous, though civilized, debate.

Frederick E. Jorden, an accountant and tax preparer in Richmond, Va., said he grew weary of tax protesters and quit checking in to the misc.taxes and us.taxes groups.

''Each time someone beats down these super-weak theories, the proponents just let it lie and then come back a few weeks later with the same rubbish,'' Mr. Jorden says. ''I stick with misc.taxes.moderated because that way I avoid seeing that dreck.''

Paul Thomas, a tax preparer in Athens, Ga., often points out bad advice in the misc.taxes and us.taxes news groups. ''What's the batting average for the tax protester group?'' Mr. Thomas asked in a recent posting before answering his own question: ''Zero.''

In misc.taxes and us.taxes, the hottest issue now is the ''861 position,'' named for a section of the tax code that holds that wages paid to Americans by domestic employers are not subject to tax. Postings assert, among other things, that the Constitution limits Congress to taxing only incomes that are derived from foreign commerce.

For nearly four decades, courts have uniformly rejected the 861 position, sometimes in opinions detailing the logical and legal fallacies on which it is based.

Another frequent claim is that only residents of the District of Columbia and certain other small areas must pay income taxes because the Constitution ''grants geographic jurisdiction to Congress based upon location, and location only.'' The Constitution actually grants the federal government concurrent jurisdiction with the states everywhere but in the nation's capital.

One misc.taxes posting observed that the tax laws cannot be enforced because ''Congress is given the power to 'lay and collect' tax. That means Congress can not give that power to the executive branch'' to enforce the tax laws but must do it itself.

Mr. Evans, the tax lawyer in Philadelphia, posted in reply that of ''all of the stupid tax denial arguments, this has to be one of the stupidest. You might as well claim that the congressional power to 'coin money' means that Congressmen must be the ones operating the stamping machines in the U.S. Mint.''

One of the latest tactics by those who claim they do not have to pay taxes is to say that the laws are valid but are illegally enforced. ''The time is now, for educating the masses about the fraudulent mis-application of the tax laws,'' wrote one posting at misc.taxes, asserting that the federal government illegally extracts income taxes and unjustly imprisons those who challenge the government on taxes.

People who boast about not paying taxes also make themselves easy targets for law enforcement. Among those lurking at the Quatloos site one recent afternoon were people with e-mail addresses showing that they work for the Justice and Treasury departments and the federal courts.

Photos: DEBUNKING -- Jay Adkisson, left, founded Quatloos.com, which includes a debate on theories advanced by foes of taxpaying. Dick Adams, right, started a moderated forum to eliminate ''frightening'' oratory that was ''drowning out serious discourse.'' (Photo by Marty Katz for The New York Times); (Photo by J. Emilio Flores for The New York Times)